"Perhaps moreso than any other genre of music, hip-hop is shaped by its environment. The genre’s origins date back to one sweaty summer night in the Bronx in 1973, when DJ Kool Herc debuted a new style of spinning records at his sister’s back-to-school party. And as the style became more popular and took off, one thing linked the artists who shaped it: they were often influenced by what they saw in their own neighborhoods.

For example, in Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s 1982 hit “The Message,” the group raps about its South Bronx home: “Broken glass everywhere / People pissing on the stairs, you know they just don’t care / I can’t take the smell, can’t take the noise / Got no money to move out, I guess I got no choice.”

"Life in the so-called inner city has always been a major theme in hip-hop. From the desolate state of the Bronx Projects described in Grandmaster Flash’s “The Message” to the poor conditions in parts of Brooklyn and Queens recounted by artists like Jay Z, Biggie, and Nas, rappers have used their music to offer a glimpse into urban spaces across the United States. For decades, they’ve used verses and hooks to allude to the relationship between hip-hop and architecture — overcrowded, dilapidated towers have been the backdrop of the genre since its inception. But that relationship is more significant than it appears to be, says designer Mike Ford, whose pioneering research in the field of hip-hop-inspired architecture has earned him a fitting sobriquet: The Hip-Hop Architect. "

Hip Hop has established itself as a gravitas culture that crosses borders of race, ethnicity, class, religion and professions. Members of the hip hop generation carry the residue of the culture into all spaces they inhabit and their individual works are seasoned with its’ flavor. As professionals continue to argue the academic validity of hip hop and disseminate the social significance of rap, it is time architectural professionals learn the benefit the culture provides to its’ practitioners.

It’s not often that the Bronx is mentioned in the same breath as Hollywood and Silicon Valley. But an exhibit being planned at the Smithsonian’s Lemelson Center in Washington, D.C. will pay homage to these areas and others as “hot spots” of innovation